Went diving Sunday with Claudette and Ross-o for a much needed therapy day on the water.

Had a good/bad omen Saturday night. I had taken my sister to Cabrillo beach for a midnight grunion run. It was an OK run, but then I decided to check the boat launch for nudies. I had explained the Melibe Leonina to her, so we were on the hunt to see them.

WOW! there were a bunch of them. (not my shot)

Suddenly a little flatfish started swimming around. I reached down and he perched on my hand.

That was the good omen. Then my phone fell out of my pocket. That was the bad omen. The funny thing was that I was not sure what fell out of my pocket until it lit up on the way down. It glowed for about 5 seconds. Rats!!!

Well at least I am going diving tomorrow.

Ross poked around the scuba forums only to find that near shore had questionable conditions, so it was off to Catalina.

Ross asked me to skipper that day. What a blast!
It is a bit stressful knowing that you are responsible for everyones safety.
Fortunately, i did not hit any buoys, whales or steamships.

All went well, and an hour later we were pulling up to ship rock.

(i did not have the presence of mind to take a photo, so I swiped this one from some unknown photog ;-)

Claudette and Ross are propellor divers and I didn't want to cramp their style, so it is a solo dive for me. I giggled a bit remembering all of the frenzied arguments about solo diving that used to go on on this board.

Swimming down to 80 few, it was gloriously peaceful. I did not have to keep track of anyone. Just me and the fish.

For some reason I was fascinated with flora.

Ok enough of that. Now for fauna.

Shots like this remind me of what a crappy UW photographer I can be… Humph!

Eventually I went shallower only to a ridiculous cloud of baitfish.

After a while it got creepy dark when a ray of light poked through the cumulinimbus sardines. It turned out that they were frightened of my bubbles. I looked up to see the sky illustrated by a column of blue water surrounded by a cylinder of fish.

I failed to get a shot. Double rats.

Dive 2,

Ross, the southern gentleman that he is, insisted that I get some scooter time. Unfortunately his camera was out of sorts, so it was his turn to shoot solo while the dive goddess and I did laps around ship rock.

I told Ross that I looked forward to taking credit for his shots.
Here they are…

Ross shot some great video of two Cephalopods snoring away.

What a difference a different shutterfinger makes.

We waved at the Sundiver as they headed around the west end.

I sat out dive 3 with a queasy tummy.

Then it was time to go back to angels gate.
I managed to dock the boat without killing anyone.

Many thanks to my dive buddies, all the critters and the sea.

All is good!

• SPRING STRAP REDUX jeff Shaw 22:20:23 05/31/10 (1)
  • Re: SPRING STRAP REDUX Chuck Tribolet 07:41:23 06/01/10 (0)